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2009-10-15 |

For safety’s sake: GMO regulations in Malaysia

NINE years after signing the Cartagena Protocol on Biosafety, the country is now about to adopt a regulation that will scrutinise modern biotechnology activities. The Biosafety Regulations (Approval and Notification) is likely to come into force early next year to facilitate the implementation of the Biosafety Act 2007 enacted by the Natural Resources and Environment Ministry. Head of the Biosafety Core Team at the ministry, Letchumanan Ramatha, says the draft regulation is in its final consultation stage.

2009-10-15 |

Uganda’s GM cotton trials are promising

Uganda has started tasting its first-ever genetically-modified cotton (GM cotton). The two-type GM cotton varieties-Herbicide Tolerant (Ht) Cotton and Bacillus thuringiensis (Bt) cotton- are being tasted by scientists at the National Semi-Arid Resource Research Institute (NaSARRI) at Serere in Soroti District. And they are showing early indicators of pest-resistance and herbicide-tolerance. NaSARRI Director Thomas Areke says Bt cotton has the ability to withstand bollworms and Ht cotton tolerates roundup chemicals sprayed to destroy weeds in confined fields trial (CFT) sites at Serere and Mubuku in Kasese district.

2009-10-15 |

BT cotton seeds sowing from next kharif in Pakistan

Minister for Food and Agriculture Nazar Muhammad Gondal talking to Dawn on Tuesday said the country will officially announce the plantation of BT cotton from April 2010. He added that the country was expected to touch production of 14 million bales next year. He said that around 20 per cent certified BT cotton would be planted next year and the cultivation area would continue to grow till the country achieves more than 90 per cent cultivation of BT cotton.

2009-10-15 |

Civil society groups urge GE crop moratorium in Pakistan

The international experts and representatives of civil society have demanded an end to land leasing to foreign investors and countries. However, they emphasised that an immediate moratorium should be placed on the use and production of genetically modified seeds and crops. Instead, the government should promote bio-diversity based ecological farming methods which would not only secure livelihood to the landless and small farmers but also ensure food security and sovereignty of the Pakistani people.

2009-10-14 |

Ireland adopts GM-free zone policy

The Irish Government will ban the cultivation of all GM crops and introduce a voluntary GM-free label for food – including meat, poultry, eggs, fish, crustaceans, and dairy produce made without the use of GM animal feed. The policy was adopted as part of the Renewed Programme for Government agreed between the two coalition partners, the centre-right Fianna Faíl and the Green Party, after the latter voted to support it on Saturday.

2009-10-14 |

Lake County (USA/California) GE committee at a standstill

The Genetically Engineered Crops Advisory Committee that could not agree on a recommendation must cut its members from 19 to seven as directed by the Lake County Board of Supervisors Tuesday. Board members voted 4-1 to shrink the committee to represent important groups such as organic farmers and non-organic farmers, have the group come up with regulations for genetically engineered (GE) crops and allow for votes to pass that aren’t unanimous, which had not been allowed.

2009-10-14 |

Human rights group opposes trial of genetically modified corn in India

aising concerns over the open air trial of genetically modified corn in Jabalpur, the Asian Human Rights Commission (AHRC) has asked the state government to stop it. In letters to Madhya Pradesh Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan and the central government, AHRC also said the ”trial is being conducted to further the commercial interest of Monsanto” - the US-based seed company.

2009-10-14 |

Nestlé India commits to provide GM-free food now & in future: Greenpeace India

Greenpeace India, an international Non-Government Organisation (NGO), has delivered anti-Genetically Modified messages on behalf of more than 28,000 consumers across India demanding that Nestlé India commit to providing GM-free food now and in future. Greenpeace activists hung banners at the Nestlé India headquarters in Gurgaon this week.

2009-10-14 |

Test tube brinjal - The history of Bt eggplants in India

On the ministry’s regulatory body’s agenda was a historic item: permission for the commercial cultivation of India’s first genetically modified food crop. [...] GEAC was forced to delay a decision on the approval till April 2009. This, because of two reports that found their way to the meeting. For India’s small but highly active and well-networked anti-GM lobby had managed to get their hands on Mahyco’s test results through a Right to Information petition.

2009-10-14 |

Indian Committee approves commercial release of Bt brinjal

The Genetic Engineering Approval Committee (GEAC), the biotechnology regulator, Wednesday approved the commercialisation of genetically modified Bt brinjal. Bt Brinjal still needs the government’s nod before its release in the market. If it gets the nod, Bt Brinjal will be the first genetically modified food in India. Members of the committee, which met here, said the genetically modified crop had the potential to increase yields by a significant extent.

2009-10-13 |

”What happens in Argentina is almost a massive experiment”

Anonymous threats, media smear campaign and political pressure were some of the consequences of an investigation into the health effects of the intensive chemical model of agriculture and, more importantly, this pressure encouraged the dissemination of the research findings. [...] Prof Carrasco knew there would be a reaction from the industrial the sector, but had not expected it to be at such a high level.

2009-10-13 |

GM climate craze seizes African food

The African Centre for Biosafety has today released a report exposing the patents and players involved in appropriating key African food crops to produce genetically modified climate crops. [...] By patenting genes that can withstand stresses like drought, heat and salinity corporations are positioning themselves to turn a fat profit.

2009-10-13 |

U.S. researchers develop new non-GE peppers and chickpeas

A new red-fruited habanero is the latest pepper with resistance to root-knot nematodes to be released by Agricultural Research Service (ARS) scientists. PA-559 is the first red-fruited habanero-type pepper [...] that has resistance to the southern root-knot nematode. It is also resistant to the peanut root-knot nematode and the tropical root-knot nematode.

2009-10-13 |

Scientists closer to developing dual-resistance non-GE cassava

IITA scientists are a step closer to making a breakthrough in developing cassava that is resistant to both the Cassava Brown Streak Disease (CBSD) and the Cassava Mosaic Disease (CMD) in Eastern and Central Africa. The two diseases are the greatest threats to cassava production in the region putting at risk the food security and livelihoods of over 200 million people. According to Edward Kanju, IITA cassava breeder, there are 14 types of the crop under research that are very promising. Kanju’s team had just harvested an advanced trial of such cassava in Uganda.

2009-10-13 |

Uganda: after decades of war, a new non-GE rice variety helps farmers resume their lives

About 1.5 million more internally displaced people are gradually moving back to their original lands after more than 20 years living a precarious existence in the refugee camps of northern Uganda. Their return is being helped by FAO’s NERICA project, which is introducing innovative, rice-based farming systems to increase food security and reduce poverty in Uganda.

2009-10-13 |

German potato breeder launches non-GE high amylopectin potatoes

Emsland Group plans processing of high amylopectin potatoes from classical breeding in their production plants in Kyritz and Cloppenburg during the second week of October. ’using nature to create’ – this guiding principle characterises the company philosophy behind the Emsland Group. Harvested raw materials are processed into innovative trendsetting quality products in tune with nature.

2009-10-12 |

Negros Oriental (Philippines) ordinance urged banning GMO products

The dream of two Negros provinces to be an organic island is yet to be realized in the absence of an ordinance banning the use and propagation of Genetically Modified Organisms in Negros Oriental, even as Negros Occidental has already passed one. It was then Negros Oriental governor George Arnaiz and the late Gov. Joseph Marañon of Negros Occidental who entered into a memorandum of agreement in 2005 aimed at transforming the two provinces into an organic island.

2009-10-12 |

Monsanto 4Q loss widens, adjusted earns beat view

Monsanto Co., the world’s biggest seed maker, said Wednesday its fourth-quarter loss widened to $233 million in the fourth quarter on lower revenue, led by a drop in sales of its Roundup herbicide which is facing on onslaught of generic competition. Its adjusted earnings narrowly beat Wall Street estimates, however. Monsanto said its loss amounted to 43 cents per share in the quarter ended Aug. 31. That’s larger than its loss of $172 million, or 31 cents per share, a year earlier.

2009-10-12 |

Pioneer and Monsanto in biotech tug-of-war

The once folksy seed business has taken on a harder edge. Lawsuits. Accusations of dirty tricks and illegal acts. An impending federal antitrust investigation. The battle is over biotechnology in seed traits. Altered genetic traits in seed germplasm have helped farmers double their yields in the last third of a century by producing corn and soybeans that can stand up better to wind, excessive moisture, plant diseases, herbicides and insects.

2009-10-12 |

Biotech industry in a quandary over research rights

Once upon a time there was a stool supporting agriculture with three legs. [...] The research leg is becoming wobbly and the stool less stable, due in part to a little noticed clause in biotech seed purchase agreements. The clause prohibits research with commercialized seed without permission. The legal language is clear. No research is allowed.

2009-10-12 |

Probe fails to back up claim that pro-GM food campaigner grew GE maize in Wales (UK)

A COUNCIL investigation failed to find evidence that pro-GM food campaigner Jonathan Harrington defied the Assembly Government and grew genetically modified maize on his smallholding. It has also emerged that Powys County Council spent £4,200 investigating the claim.

2009-10-12 |

GM findings in Canadian mustard ”misconstrued”

A drop in mustard prices in recent weeks isn’t out of line with what other crops have seen and has ”little to do” with allegations of contamination in Canadian mustard shipped to Europe, according to a Saskatchewan mustard growers’ agency. Environmental group Greenpeace last month posted a statement on its Austrian website claiming Maille, a well-known French manufacturer of mustards, vinegars and oils owned by Unilever, had found a ”genetically modified (GM) canola event” in tests on its Dijon mustard.

2009-10-09 |

GM crops call for caution, Cameroonian bishop tells Synod of Bishops for Africa

Africa should be cautious in its approach to genetically modified agriculture ”even if it promises economic salvation” for the impoverished continent, a bishop from Cameroon said. Bishop George Nkuo of Kumbo said [at the Synod of Bishops for Africa] that because the long-term impact of such new technology on human and environmental health is still not clear, ”we in Cameroon suggest that Africa should not rush blindly to embrace it.”

2009-10-09 |

Monsanto forecasts Africa to increase biotech crop planting

Monsanto Co., the world’s biggest seed producer, expects African countries to increase planting of genetically-modified crops to boost food security and economic development as the region is affected by climate change. Burkina Faso plans to double the area planted with the company’s insect-resistant cotton next year from 129,000 hectares (318,766 acres) this year, Natalie DiNicola, director at Monsanto’s public policy and sustainable yield division, said in an interview yesterday.

2009-10-09 |

U.S. Interfaith Center on Corporate Responsibility raises concern about SmartStax approval

The hurried review and approval this summer by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) of Monsanto’s SmartStax genetically modified corn has now been called into question by the late September federal court ruling against a genetically modified, herbicide-resistant strain of sugar beets, according to the Interfaith Center on Corporate Responsibility (ICCR), a broad-based coalition of nearly 300 faith-based investors with over $100 billion in invested capital.

2009-10-09 |

Monsanto questioned by Justice Department on rival’s complaint

Monsanto Co., the world’s largest seed producer, said it received questions from the U.S. Justice Department about anti-competition complaints that rival DuPont Co. made in a lawsuit. The Justice Department’s inquiry is another sign the Obama administration is taking an aggressive approach to antitrust enforcement. Philip Weiser, the antitrust division’s deputy assistant attorney general, said at an August meeting on agriculture markets that the government had ”concerns about the competitive consequences of how the marketplace is evolving.”

2009-10-09 |

Courts force U.S. reckoning with dominance of GM crops

The United States is well into its mass experiment with GM crops. Some 90 percent of soy and cotton crops include genes engineered by firms like Monsanto Co., Dow Chemical Co. and DuPont to resist weedkillers and act as pesticides. Eighty-five percent of the corn crop is also genetically modified, and, in the form of high-fructose corn syrup, is found throughout the food system. With GM genes so widely spread, some agriculture giants have had to move their conventional seed production out of the United States to meet strict foreign standards banning GM material. There could soon come a day, activists warn, that thanks to the drift of pollen, no ear of corn will be free of at least a trace of cells concocted by man

2009-10-09 |

U.S. Department of Agriculture research ripe for overhaul: Shah

Shah, who led research at the Gates Foundation before the Obama administration named him to his USDA post, said he will use his role as ”Chief Scientist” to focus resources around priority areas, seeking breakthroughs in food safety, food security, climate change, biofuels and human nutrition. [...] The USDA also will formally establish the National Institute of Food and Agriculture [...] led by Roger Beachy [...] known for his pioneering research in genetically modified crops, and his work with Monsanto Co.

2009-10-08 |

Biotech industry brings South African farmer to Europe to promote GE crops

Motlatsi Everest Musi, a small-scale maize farmer in South Africa [who acquired 21 hectares of land through South Africa’s land redistribution for agricultural development programme in 2004], has been cultivating genetically modified Bt-maize since 2005. He told reporters at a EuropaBio event on Wednesday that growing the technology had boosted his profits and enabled him to expand his business.

2009-10-08 |

Superweeds out-flank glyphosate: calling for cultivators

Chemical-based no-till farming rose to prominence in the ’70s thanks to the efficacy and low cost of glyphosate-based herbicides, which offered broad-spectrum weed control. Initially a burndown treatment, they became over-the-top weed controls as varieties were modified genetically to tolerate the lethal chemistry. [...] As predicted from the start by weed ecologists, repeated use of glyphosate on the same weed species in the same crops year after year had an unwanted result. More weed varieties are surviving the chemical that used to kill every plant that had not been genetically designed to withstand its biological monkey-wrenching.

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